The Pleasures of Commuting

I love commuting to and from work. I am able to log about 1.5 hours per day of riding that I would otherwise be sitting in a car. Then again, the thing that I don't like about commuting, is that people can be oblivious to other users of the road.

For instance, on Monday evening, a driver made a quick maneuver to the right while traveling at about 25 mph. It just so happened that I was position immeiately off of the rear quarter-panel of that car. The result was that I got pinched between the car and a mailbox. Fortunately, I rode it out and stayed on the bike. The driver, to my knowledge, first became aware of my presence when I hit his driver side mirror with my hand, and expressed my displeasure with a raised hand and a WTF expression on my face. Imagining that I was done with this encounter, I continued pedalling. The driver, however, displeased with the fact that he almost ran me over and that I touched his car, drove exceedingly fast to catch me. I say this because he drove into the oncoming traffic lane to pass cars to approach me. He drove next to me (within inches) and was yelling at me. I gave him the American hand gesture to get out of my face (a choice finger raised), and yelled "get outta here!" at the top of my lungs. He sped to the next intersection and exited his vehicle to approach me. I deftly veered around him. He proceded to repeat that maneuver. He drove to the next intesection and began to get out of his car. I simply turned down another road to avoid any further escalation of the event.

While this was happening, I did not log his license plate number. The only thing I know it that it was a smaller blue car. Bright blue, like the color used on the Internet Explorer title bar . I think it was a Toyota Celica or another similar economy car. The driver was a heavy african american man, approximately 6' to 6'2".

Given this man's irrational behavior and the threat that he posed to my life, I am logging the event here to make sure my story is told, in the event that fellow decides to visit me again on the road.